Things That Never Die
by ncfan
Summary: Raven reflects about her former teammate, Terra. Post-Aftershock.


Things That Never Die

Disclaimer: I don't own Teen Titans.

Author's Notes: Don't forget, Raven is a teenage girl, and if some of what she says strikes you as being melodramatic, just keep in mind that she is a teenager.

* * *

Did you know what was going to happen when you stopped that volcano? Terra, you are many things, but you never struck me as being a martyr.

When you first came, I wasn't sure what to think. You were a tomboyish little girl who almost instantly got along better with the others much better than I ever could. You were a loose cannon, but impossibly lovable. But I couldn't be sure; you always came across as being a better version of me. Kinder, sweeter and easier to love.

So I wasn't too broken up when you left for the first time. I was a little concerned that you were going out into the wild again, and that you were leaving in a state of emotional turmoil, but other than that, nothing really worried me. I knew you to be a tough, self-reliant girl who would hopefully be alright out in the wild. I just hoped you'd packed sunscreen.

So the Tower was quiet for two months. Beast Boy pined over your absence, in a sickeningly annoying way that was actually kind of sweet. I wish you had appreciated how much he missed you.

Then, you came back. And you were different. Somehow, you had managed to control your powers. I'll admit, jealousy colored my judgments of you just a little bit. What I would never be able to have, you had achieved within the space of two months, seemingly without any help. You seemed to take it for granted, too.

You had more confidence in yourself. That hurt, too, for that as well was something I lacked.

We didn't get off to the best start. You admitted it yourself. Our powers are very similarly based, and we are both, if nothing else, tenacious and hard-headed. We both have strong personalities, and that would naturally lead to clashes.

But we reconciled. We found a common chord. You had proved yourself to me; I thought you to be a woman of honor.

I swore to myself that I would be your friend. _Her heart cried as she wrote and said this._ And when I make a promise, unless someone forces my hand, I keep it.

So all I could do was watch.

All I could do was watch as you completely supplanted my place in their hearts._ Tears flooded her voice._ Suddenly, everything changed. You were the one Starfire dragged to "the mall of shopping". You were the one Cyborg gushed about his car to, the car _I_ helped him rebuild. You were the one Robin talked to about improving the obstacle course. You were the one Beast Boy bombarded with corny jokes.

It was seamless and instantaneous; there was no middle ground. It was as though I had never existed.

Just as they were beginning to truly accept me, I was pushed out once again. I was the odd one out, just as I had always been. I was once again the strange one: creepy and weird, the one no one approached or wanted to approach. Never had I felt more alone. I have not yet regained that acceptance, and I'm not sure if I ever will.

You brought to light a very painful truth, Terra. I have always been, and will always be on the outside looking in. I will never be one of _them_, no matter how hard I try. I appreciate the truth, Terra, and no matter…_She paused to bow her head in abject agony as something behind her cracked_…no matter how painful…it may be, the truth is the truth, and for that…and for that, I thank you.

As time passed, I began to become used to the fact that no one seemed interested in trying to get me to spend time with them.

So I came out of my room more often. I stayed in the living room and on the roof whenever everybody was there; I took any excuse I could to be near them, to feel, like, for even one moment, that I belonged.

I let go of my anger towards you. I allowed myself to relax my guard around you. My suspicions about your loyalties dropped. I guess that was a mistake.

One night, you disappeared, taking Beast Boy with you.

That was the night Slade's robots attacked. It started out quietly, as many nights do. It was late enough that we had all gone to bed. Then Cyborg decided to go for a midnight snack. His stomach nearly killed him.

You had disabled the security codes, so well over two hundred of Slade's foot soldiers could get into the Tower. But after that, the Tower was placed on lockdown. We were locked in…with them. With the power out, our expansive tower became a frightening and claustrophobic battlefield.

By the end, our home was well nigh destroyed. We spent several days afterwards throwing out remains of robotic body parts, and for hours after the main stretch of fighting was over, we were still finding lone foot soldiers fighting despite the fact that the body of the army was shattered.

The intent was for us all to be killed. I can only assume that you wanted to spare Beast Boy because in some way you cared about him.

Considering what you did to him instead, you might have been more kind to put a spike of rock through his heart.

When he came back, he refused to talk to any of us. He wouldn't meet our eyes, and he made a beeline for your room. And there he stayed for nearly twenty four hours.

You had betrayed us. We all knew it. You had come into our lives, deceived us, twisted us, then broke us. You broke me.

I trusted you. And you betrayed me.

Because of you, we lost something we could never regain. Cyborg, Robin and I lost our security. Beast Boy and Starfire lost that small bit of innocence that they had been so tenaciously clinging to.

When we discovered how deep your betrayal had gone, we were forced to change everything.

Our rooms are no longer in the same place because of you; yours is the only room left unchanged and untouched.

We threw out every bit of food in the refrigerator, fearing poison (We performed a similar purging of the medicine cabinet). Our eating habits have changed. No longer do we go out to eat; instead, we pick up our pizza and bring it back home to eat, and even then, only one (or two if the past few days have been quiet) of us goes to get it, and we return as soon as we can.

Every inch of the Tower was gone over for listening devices and cameras. And we found them everywhere. We're still finding them, even now. The living room, the garage, the training room, the evidence room, even our _bedrooms_. You had to know what you were doing when you put cameras in our rooms. I felt, if it was possible, even more exposed and violated than I had before; we all did.

The security systems were improved; gone are the days that you can simply go up to the island and not expect to have a myriad of alarms blaring at ear-grating decibels. There are more security codes needed to access the Tower than before; they are to be changed three times a year, more frequently if needed. Our calls and mail are all screened and tracked back to their original sources. The locks have been changed; my door and all the other's doors are now equipped with locks and access pads that can only be overridden by Robin, and that's only if he has the emergency access code to our room. Locks, Terra. We _never_ had locks on our doors before this. Even Robin didn't.

We have been forced to change our habits, _all_ of our habits, because of your espionage. No longer do I meditate from four in the afternoon to five, and very rarely do I meditate alone. Cyborg doesn't spend as much time on his car as he does improving the security and weapons systems, and surveying the city and newspaper headlines. Combat practice is held an hour later than it used to be, and instead of being held twice a week, it is held three times a week. We do nighttime patrolling now, in rotating pairs, and we do it in shifts; one pair takes the first half of the night, and one pair takes the second half. None of us go anywhere outside the Tower alone anymore, and we as a whole don't go out as much as we used to; Robin and I hardly ever leave the island at all these days, except when there's trouble knocking.

We all handled it in different ways.

For days afterward, Beast Boy would come out of his room only late at night, to sneak food from the newly re-stocked refrigerator. After that, when he rejoined us, he never spoke a word around us. We were careful to never utter your name in his hearing.

Robin trained more intensely, more obsessively. We had to replace the punching bag at least once a week. He became moody, obsessed with finding Slade. This obsession remained silent, but gnawing away at his psyche until hardly anything else seemed to be left.

Cyborg worked on his car. He smoothed out every ding, every crack. The paint job was spotless; the windshield gleamed. But he grew dull and gray.

Starfire was…complicated. She took it much better than I'd hoped, or seemed to. For a few days, she was able to be cheerful, if somewhat subdued, and still acted like her old self. But about a week later, she came into my room in the dead of night, saying she'd had a nightmare, and promptly dissolved into tears.

I am an empath. The emotions of others affect my emotional state, my mental state. Their grief swamped me, threatened to consume me. Where Beast Boy was stricken, I became stricken. Where Robin was enraged, so I was furious.

But my emotions were my own. My grief was my own. My rage was my own. My betrayal was my own. You made me feel like I had been ripped apart. I had trusted too easily, and this was what the result was.

Robin was fearful that I distrusted my friends not to hurt me the way you had. And I was. I'm afraid I always will be, because of you.

But we managed to regain a sense of normalcy. We were able to act like you had never existed. And that was how we went. There was an unspoken law: you were never to be spoken of.

So we smiled in the light, and cried in the dark when we thought no one could see. But we saw. We all did.

For about a month, things went back to normal. Then, you returned. You caught us off-guard; we were utterly defeated.

When we returned to the Tower, I called you evil. As much as I hated you that day, I hated myself a thousand fold more for calling you that. I hated myself for I lie awake in bed at night and wonder if I am evil myself.

We split up. A decision that very nearly led to our deaths.

You turned me inside out. You knew everything to make me lose my so-fragile control.

You brought up every issue that ate away at me. You twisted my insecurities, emphasized the fact that I would never be normal or in control. You made me feel worthless, insignificant. Just as you always had.

My control lost, you manipulated every aspect of our duel to your advantage. When my demon surfaced, you were scared. But you overcame that fear quickly.

I could feel your triumph, your grim satisfaction, as you dragged me into the depths, drowning me, as the hands of your minion closed around me throat, choking me.

Did you really hate me that much?

We gathered, broken and afraid. We were ready to admit defeat and flee for our lives, and then Robin came back. Suddenly, we were rallied against you.

We waited for three weeks, to lull you and Slade into a false sense of security. We were forced to watch in horror as people fled from their homes, as people were killed. Though at that time I believed I hated you, I couldn't help but notice something. You never took part in the killings; you were never in the places were people were gunned down, and wherever you were, the foot soldiers used moderation.

In that three weeks, my tempestuous feelings of hate cooled from a violent fire to a cold icy plain. At that point, the main goal in my life was to take you out.

Then we resurfaced. No one was holding back any more. Though I was the only one to explicitly try, we were all hell bent on killing you. Even Beast Boy. Especially Beast Boy.

You ran. Just as you always do. And Slade made sure you didn't get away with it.

Later, we discovered what the true nature of what your deal with Slade was. You made a deal with the Devil, and discovered what Hell was really like.

When we arrived, we discovered you on the verge of killing he whom you had once claimed to love. That was the last straw for me. I would have killed, there and then, but I discovered that Beast Boy had finally been able to expel the destructive hatred he had felt for you since you brought our city to its knees. He no longer hated you, and that alone stayed my vengeful hand.

And then, you turned once again. You were never one to endure punishing treatment from anyone, and you had been double-crossed yourself.

What troubled me was that the only time you ever found the nerve to turn on him was when you were being faced down by four of your former best friends, all ready to kill you if you so much as breathed wrong.

You didn't find the will to turn until forced, but you never did anything half-heartedly.

You killed Slade. Were you hoping that you would die yourself that night? I would understand if you were. There were times when I was young that after making some of my more serious transgressions, that I wished I could die for spilling the blood of another. But my healing ability wouldn't let me. _He_ wouldn't let me.

You sacrificed yourself to save us all. I ask again. Are you a martyr, Terra?

When we found you, we were expecting a body, a lifeless corpse. What we did find shocked us even more.

You were locked in the earth, a part of your element. You had turned to stone. I'm not sure how it happened. The only thing I can think of is that your massive power finally overwhelmed you, as mine threatens to engulf me.

There were tears on your cold face. Did you weep? Did you know what was going to happen to you? I can not fathom what it was like, for you to have been alone, waiting to die. I wish I had stayed with you.

All the false hate I bore you melted away, and I was left with only horrible sadness, and a strange, indistinct respect and regret.

There were two tragedies. The deaths of so many innocents was one. The other tragedy is that you will never be able to defend yourself against those left behind.

We remember you as a hero. They remember you as a murderer. It is only my protective spells that keep unruly, bitter teenagers from entering your cavern and defacing you.

I hope with all my heart that we will be able to change their opinions about you.

You will be alright, Terra. No matter how long we have to wait to find a cure, no matter how long you remain in your earthen prison, you will be alright. You have two things that are truly eternal.

For even when love must surrender itself to the mists, and life and time is naught but dust, treachery never dies, and neither does courage.

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Just a little explanatory note. After the events of the _Aftershock_ episodes, the Titans all wrote letters to Terra, mainly to let out all of their feelings about her (In my Teen Titans universe). Raven's is much longer than that of the others, even Beast Boy and Robin's, mainly because the only outlet for her emotions is physical exertion and writing down her feelings, so she poured everything into the paper. Pent-up vitriol, pain, anger, sadness, envy, guilt, self-loathing, it's all here. I hope you enjoyed it.


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